HIST 679 Latin Hagiography of the Later Middle Ages
This colloquium aims to introduce participants to the genre of hagiography (writings on the saints) and the modern discipline of hagiography, the study of sanctity in all its multi-faceted manifestations. Thus the course examines medieval writings about saints and sanctity along with the recent body of literature that employs hagiography as a source for understanding medieval society. Moving from the Bollandists and the emergence of hagiography as a scholarly discipline, the course looks at a wide variety of methodological approaches to the study of sanctity through topics such as vitae, canonization, pilgrimage, relics, miracles, gender, and local religion.